The movie could have been even better (article)

It's not the people wanting a longer cut that's the problem. I'm sure everyone would have loved seeing a few more minutes here and there... it's those multiplex conglomerates who want to shove in as many multiple showings of something as possible that the studios feel they have to cater to. I once heard that someone made them cut 7 seconds out of Nightmare Before Christmas for no dang reason. The Shadow Oogie Boogie thing that was supposed to be in the middle of the song.

My sister told me that there's a huge cut out of Suckerpunch that makes more sense on the blu ray (I HATE that they only put features on those stupid things). I'm not exactly sure what it is.

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They made him cut Suckerpunch to a pg-13, read that somewhere about Snyder. When you see it, it feels like an R rated film...at at least a hard PG-13...i think it woulda made just as much or more as a rated R film. I HAAAAAATE when films that should be rated R get neutered to be pg-13.

One thing I wonder: With the Muppets needing the money by a certain time, wouldn't they actually need to have all of the money handy by the end of the telethon? If people called and pledged money, wouldn't it take awhile to actually get the money to the theater?

And I wonder what they did with all the money they made when they didn't reach the amount needed. Did the Muppets split it amongst themselves? Did they donate all the money to charity? Did the network keep the money?

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Like the travel by map gag, or walter leaving an outline of himself in the wall, sometimes I realize(least for myself) its best not to ponder these sort of things regarding the Muppets

They made him cut Suckerpunch to a pg-13, read that somewhere about Snyder. When you see it, it feels like an R rated film...at at least a hard PG-13...i think it woulda made just as much or more as a rated R film. I HAAAAAATE when films that should be rated R get neutered to be pg-13.

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The ratings system drives me nuts like that. R movies have to be made PG-13 for no reason... PG movies are just souped up G movies. I remember when you could cuss in PG movies. Like the first TMNT movie you had an understandable amount of violence and Raph dropping the "D" bomb several times in the beginning of the film.... much as I loved the CGI one, it felt really toned down from that.

The edits in this movie, while my only problem, don't drive me half as nuts as what MFS was supposed to be like or even the Snoop Dogg cameo in VMX (only because of the Electric Mayhem). Hopefully some will be reinstated into the film on DVD.

The ratings system drives me nuts like that. R movies have to be made PG-13 for no reason... PG movies are just souped up G movies. I remember when you could cuss in PG movies. Like the first TMNT movie you had an understandable amount of violence and Raph dropping the "D" bomb several times in the beginning of the film.... much as I loved the CGI one, it felt really toned down from that.

The edits in this movie, while my only problem, don't drive me half as nuts as what MFS was supposed to be like or even the Snoop Dogg cameo in VMX (only because of the Electric Mayhem). Hopefully some will be reinstated into the film on DVD.

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I swear we'll be on here in the year 2012 and you'll still be mentioning how bad Oz is, the problems with the MFS pre production, Weinsteins and Fraggles, and the Snoop edit on VMX (i kid! I have my things I harp on) Maybe by 2012 Diz will release Season 4 and 5? The tv movie edits dont bother me, as thats where you TRULY are pressed for every second. Notice seinfeld and other 90s shows had 23 minute run times of actual shows. Now? Big bang clocks in at maybe 19 min in the torrents i download.

A movie should have PLENTY of time to breathe, and the more I see the new film the more I realize its plagued with a number of issues

Intelligently pointing out ways to improve a film is not "hating on it" nor does it hurt the movie itself.

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Well.....

I've seen it happen too many times before. A great new boon to fan kind everybody but a small handful likes it... then the handful that doesn't points out the flaws, and slowly but surely, everyone winds up agreeing and then it goes from the greatest thing ever to the worst. While I do agree the film's problem WAS in the editing... it was IN the editing. Everything that was cut sounds great and could have improved the film itself. It felt like it went by too fast, but it wasn't klunky, chunky and ran like a tank like some of the other movies I've seen. I bet the writers and directors weren't too keen on cutting what they had to cut either. Why is everyone afraid of a 2 hour Muppet Movie when kids sit through 3 hour Harry Potter films all the time? A few minutes here and there of added exchanges and scenes that describe things would have done the movie a world of good.

I still think this film was great. At least, like a MUCH better done version of VMX. But keep it in perspective. It is a stepping stone for future projects. If it was a critical and commercial flop that doomed the franchise, then I'd see disliking the film, even for what it was. Happens all the time. Look at Looney Tunes Back in Action. The next film will either follow the same path this one has or be a different direction. Either way, we'd see improvement with kinks worked out, or something else. Nothing to worry about either way. And Hey! At least it wasn't another Classic retelling.

Intelligently pointing out ways to improve a film is not "hating on it" nor does it hurt the movie itself.

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I can see where Duke is going with that notion. I mean I agree with him. Trust me, my issues with the film are strictly kept here and only for discussion with hardcore fans. The film works and does what it is suppose to do I feel. But for me personally I just have a lot of chagrins about it. But man, I cant wait to see what weekend end BO returns will be. We're all pulling for this, and giddy over what move Disney will do next in terms of greenlight. You guys might finally get that halloween special, or another sort of special and eventually a tv show.

But at the same time, don't make making intelligent criticisms a big bad thing to do. Keep that in perspective.

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Oh definitely not. Yeah. But it is a slippery slope and I've seen it happen WAAAAY too many times. It's like with the TMNT fandom (that I'm entirely done with) LOVED the 2k3 series... then the toy company screwed around with it and then it ended on a flat note and everyone retroactively hated it and found pieces to pick off. Same thing with the new movie. Everyone liked it at first, one guy said something and everyone hated it...

But in that case, there were stepping stones that had no footing. If this movie did poorly and was the last thing ever and buried the franchise, we'd all slam it on every reason. Look how we treat MFS after the fact. WOW... Of course, if this movie failed to bring the character's back, Looney Tunes BIA style, it would have also looked like a titanic failure in the eyes of the fans.

By no means is this movie perfect (but then again, not everything Jim did was gold... Mother Goose Stories... the ULTIMATE example), but I didn't expect it to be. But it is no where near as screwed up as some of the films I've seen this year. or in the past couple anyway. Even if I didn't like this film one bit, I'd ride the happy hype train to bringing the characters back to relevance. That's how we get more classic stuff... which is a shame, but that's the way it works. So far, they've made tentative plans to rerelease all the movies in their ownership on Blu-ray, so I can assume the rest of the TV show and maybe even specials aren't too far behind. I can't say I loved the Smurf movie, but it's successful and if that means Papercuts will release more books I can't completely complain.

Oh definitely not. Yeah. But it is a slippery slope and I've seen it happen WAAAAY too many times. It's like with the TMNT fandom (that I'm entirely done with) LOVED the 2k3 series... then the toy company screwed around with it and then it ended on a flat note and everyone retroactively hated it and found pieces to pick off. Same thing with the new movie. Everyone liked it at first, one guy said something and everyone hated it...

But in that case, there were stepping stones that had no footing. If this movie did poorly and was the last thing ever and buried the franchise, we'd all slam it on every reason. Look how we treat MFS after the fact. WOW... Of course, if this movie failed to bring the character's back, Looney Tunes BIA style, it would have also looked like a titanic failure in the eyes of the fans.

By no means is this movie perfect (but then again, not everything Jim did was gold... Mother Goose Stories... the ULTIMATE example), but I didn't expect it to be. But it is no where near as screwed up as some of the films I've seen this year. or in the past couple anyway. Even if I didn't like this film one bit, I'd ride the happy hype train to bringing the characters back to relevance. That's how we get more classic stuff... which is a shame, but that's the way it works. So far, they've made tentative plans to rerelease all the movies in their ownership on Blu-ray, so I can assume the rest of the TV show and maybe even specials aren't too far behind. I can't say I loved the Smurf movie, but it's successful and if that means Papercuts will release more books I can't completely complain.

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I thought online Turtle and Sonic fans sucked in 2003 Muppet fandom is one of the only nice niche fan circles online.

I LOVVVVVVVVED TMNT 2007(the film) I thought it was the best film since the 1990 Turtles film. I believe I even used the words visionary and a masterpiece in my review of the time. You cannot be a Turtle fan and hate on 2003 Turtles. Its exactly what the franchise needed and it ran its course when it did. Ninja Turtles are dead. As a lifelong fan I accept this. I was just happy to get the 2003-2007 era. After 2007 I stopped caring(Imagi animation is now dead too)
And I think youre the only mature/sane Sonic fan Ive ever seen online, so congrats (Im a huge Sonic game/cartoon/comic fan, but I will never go on any Sonic fan forums)

The situation with the Muppets is mixed for me. It seems like Disney and other companies has no confidence in the franchise on one hand(zero promotional tie-ins, zero promos, hardly any movie related merchandise), even tho at the last minute Disney did a massive advertising blitzkrieg with tv/offline/movie ads and press junkets. Its provided a wealth of amazing new muppet interviews and segments

I now have a new respect and love of Muppets From Space, strange as it sounds.
I mean if anything the first act is amazing and exactly the way I expected it to be.
I have fond memories of 1999. I can't see myself rewatching the new film too many times, cept for maybe certain segments. However I am rooting with every nano fiber that the film continues to have legs and help bring them back. Im very much looking forward to future projects

MFS is a film I really truly liked, but there's just something that completely bugs me... it's like there's a joyful jumble of Muppets at the beginning right up until Pepe says "we will now be having baloney sammiches...without ze bread." and then 90% of the characters just randomly leave. How fun would it have been to see all the characters fight over the television and Kermit trying to convince them all that they have to support Piggy and watch the same thing? The concept of all the muppets living in one house was lost through most of the movie... though they randomly turn back up at Gonzo's party. Plus, I really hate how Piggy's just there in the film. They seem to remember she's a diva... that's about it.

If nothing else, this movie did ONE thing right by making Kermit and Piggy a complex couple. They sort of did that with VMX... but everything else featured them already married or sort of a couple.. or in MFS's case... they live sort of togetherish.

But I DID love the scenes with VanNeuter and the bit with Rizzo and the rats in the lab... the best thing about the movie is Jeffery Tambor and Bobo. The worst thing was the lack of new music. The 70's soundtrack makes no sense to me, then or now. I can see the 1980's music they had in the background... this film was an homage to corny 80's films as much as it was to the Muppets... though I think they should have had an instrumental version of Moving Right Along instead of Cars... I wish they kept that scene where the slow awkward pause was cut by Mahna Mahna...

Still... I don;t think the hecticness of the film is anywhere near as bad as VMX or worse... MOz. But it didn't get to breathe like MTI did.